2nd life

how funny that i should love a game called second life. i'll write more about my SL lust, and my computer's impotance, since i really need a new computer to actually get into the thing. someone wrote something about how it is a self-imposed "matrix" refering to the movie. i can see their point. its a very complex virtual world. and if you are creative there is the allure of creating not just a 3-d avitar of your own making, but a virtual home, art, landscape, hell your own virtual asthetic. imagine if a other worldly artist like geiger (the guy who designed the creature from alien), or someone more fuzzy like maurice sendak or dr. seuss could construct his own virtual island and inhabitants? that is second life. complete freedom to create in a virtual world. now cross that with just a touch of the social elements of myspace and you get the idea. you can create a basic avitar, tweak it and just socialize and talk to people, got to virtual concerts, other people's islands, or whatever you like. you can sell your creations-- clothes, furnature, objects, body shapes sizes, tattoos for your avitar, cars, houses-- with a SL based currency. it really is impressive.

although somethings are to be expected. fantasy geeks and nerds have a head start. i was on the other day and happened to start up a conversation with a woman from "frisco" she had been in SL for about a year, and finally upgraded her computer specifically for SL. she took me on a tour to a couple of fantastically detailed islands, first an elf island complete with 'shrooms that make you (virtually) trip. and little dragon-flies that look more like little dragons. sadly all the elves were absent. i suppose whatever hour we were there all the elves were hard at work in their real life workshops. next stop was a place where they were preparing for a dragon auction. it was a very detailed place with stone walls and dragons of all shapes and sizes, some of them 4 times my avitar's height breathing fire. i was astounded. the cities that you always teleport into when you first start looked simple in comparison.

as usual i long for a world unimagined in places like this. with things i love, like street art, scifi with a mix of hip hop soul and asia-- just something less-- for lack of a better way of putting it, stock. the castle with dragons as i said was amazing, but i wanted something i hadn't seen before.

i overheard that there were sex clubs, in SL, but really you needed to be a little more used to how things worked in SL before you enjoyed those. for everything you want to do visually say, have your avatar breakdance, you can get or write a script. and this is where the geeks inherit the earth. you can do pretty much anything in SL but for complex things you need to either have linden $$$$ or learn to program. and well, the geeks have a huge head start.

hi rosie!

so i have a new crush. i haven't a clue what she looks like, but she is awesome! hi, rosie. now, half the time i'm not sure where my blog is, and some how she found it, and thought enough to post a reply, which is great and all, but what got me was i looked at her blog which had a great title like "smokey mountain breakdown." now, i want to make it clear, i am not a stalker, i am waaaaaaaaaaay to lazy for that. i just looked at her profile and read a bit of her blog, which i think is just curtious since she read mine. anyways she lives with goats and a dog and her interests are listed as: Puppetry Art Costume Design & Construction Comparative Theology Fishing Hunting Goats Chickens LBG/Gender Studies Antiques all things dog barbeque kickboxing social history politics journalism Democrats. now i just think that's the coolest. i know i've only written about gender theory, but really there are other things i love, many of them on her list. now i would rather be forced to become an accountant than fish, but i am soo in the democrats that don't mind guns camp, i adore anti-cues, puppets (like the complex ones, not the sock ones) i drool at costume design and when pressed i can sew (badly, but still), and i love ring sports. and while i prefer ifc to kick boxing, my favorite is sumo wrestling, which i love for it's tradition as well as the action. oh, and lord knows i love movies, and she lists fritz lang somewhere, and there is something so beautiful about german expressionism. but really my taste leans towards the asian right now. and i have discovered my love of korean film is somewhat trendy. it's just they are making the most compelling work for me.but anyhow, here is to rosey, one of (i assume) my fantastic 3 readers (think the other two are me)!

web gender neutrality

this is my reply to an essay in the big queer blog re:gender neutral terms here:
http://www.bigqueer.com/index.php?/archives/196-Shes-Not-Heavy,-Zies-My-Non-Gendered-Sibling-Why-Gender-Neutral-Pronouns-Dont-Work-for-Me.html
their main argument is that they will never gain currency.

my reply:
i think you actually missed something in your thought about gender neutral pronouns, and your assumptions of it's ultimate goals. perhaps their use isn't for a gender revolution as you define it, but rather one as we ("new gendered/transgendered") people define it. perhaps it's simply a way of showing equal respect for those who are in the middle. instead of the purposeful, bigoted use of incorrect gender pronouns.while i agree that queering the use of pronouns (by queers) as you point out does a bit to disable gender, it is largely contained in a subculture, and has little chance of gaining currency in the larger society. i disagree with you, that these words will never take hold. i think they are in their infancy. in the 30's there was no transgendered. before it was zhe is an "invert" but we have changed to see and recognize those who's gender has changed or in the process of changing. i think in the future gender will be very different from how we see it now, and i think the next generation may find creative expression in lives that are gender neutral, and at first it will be weird, and people will need to come "out" and it will become more and more common, as will pronouns that describe those who understand or project themselves absent of gender. not all revolutions are the loud, it-happened-over-night ones. and not all revolutions are about completely dismantling what came before them. sometimes they simply strive to make room for those who had no room. or to create new freedoms. sometimes revolutions are personal, and take place when people who look themselves in the eye and understand that they are different than they've been taught. just like the queers before us did.


but on further thought i would amend my comments to say this:
i don't think that the linguistic queering of gender in the queer community really does much to disable gender, not just in the larger community, but even in the queer community.


using this essay about, of all things, postmodern evolutionary theory in 'The French Lieutenant's Woman.' by tony e. jackson, we find a slightly succinct synopsis of post modern critique-- which is perfect for looking at gender. understanding this, we discover that to truly disable gender requires more than the occasional, intentional queering. items in brackets [] are mine added for context.


quote:
"The elements of postmodern thinking that will be most relevant here revolve, as always, around the fundamental critique of metaphysical absolutes of all kinds, a metaphysical absolute being any representation [like gender] that is taken consciously or unconsciously as entirely self-contained, self-identical, self-present, and therefore outside the realm of culture, history, desire, and ideology.
....
In any case, whatever the particular realm in which the critique of metaphysical absolutes occurs, one common outcome is the discovery that absolutes of this kind always function as unconscious anchors for a certain kind of identity. So the critique typically involves two most general results: It reveals that a given absolute is in fact a construction of history, culture, and desire, and it reveals that the construction has been misrecognized as an absolute because a certain self or cultural or sexual identity depends on not seeing the construction as a construction."
unquote.

in other words, we think of gender in this culture as being something entirely natural. but using a postmodern critique, we see that gender is false, constructed. carefully crafted to hide it's lies and seams. the seams-- what makes natural gender obviously false-- in this case are the transgendered, intersexed, and androgynous. when we use the tools that hide gender's artificiality (our gender specific pronouns), we reinforce it's lies, pushing the transgendered back into a useless binary of male/female. creating and using words that force us to realize gender is not a binary, either or proposition, makes us look at the lies of a natural gender as just that, lies.

ADDENDUM:
i went out to dinner and a show with an old friend of mine. my friend is exactly a year and one day older than i am , which means she's somewhere in her 40s. she is easily one of the most intelligent, down to earth people i've met. i mention her because at the show we were talking about people who look interesting, and she commented that she was thinking about changing her androgenous look, which, i think, which suits her. she is at once feminine, sexy, masculine and androgyne simultaniously. imagine a petite salt and pepper haired annie lennox, but softer. she prefers men's suits, but is the only person i know who still wears aprons everytime she cooks. her scent is armani for men, and loves cosmetics. she straddles all of these things, both male and female. i don't know how she'd feel about being adressed with a neutral pronouns, i suspect she wouldn't like it. she is very much a female bodied female, and despite her straddling gender, her gender is something that is in tune with her sex. (hopefully the reader is aware of the three parts of sexual identity and of their differences-- SSG--sex, sexuality and gender) but my main case for using them, isn't that i expect it to be in vogue next year. it's that i think those words are the tools for the next generation to define themselves, in the same way that transexual was a means of self-defination for the generation before mine, transgendered for my generation.

a few days ago i was looking at online music editing sites. there were two: and when you are entering info about yourself, the options are male, female and transgendered. most mainstream sites haven't figured that one out, but this one has. beautiful little steps.... where our generation really took the idea of crossing gender seriously, i think the next will actually TRANCEND gender. i think we are too attached to gender. the next generation won't be as tethered. and in the same way we used words like gay, dyke, queer, and trans common, they will make being free of gender common in language. no one really requires anyone to use GN words, now days, why should they? there really aren't that many people who insist on it. but those who follow after us...well, we've laid the foundation. and i couldn't be a prouder mama.

transendant transgressive

well, in transfering this essay, i lost it and also deleted it from my gmail account as well, so i need to re-write it. below are signposts of what i can remember now.
signposts:
television as a vehicle to pop TG education;all my children,visability VS. cumulative viewing relationship; stages of social acceptance. big brother uk, maury povich, jerry springer, david e kelly, rescue me, friends, nip/tuck.

part two/alt essay: gendertheories:feminism, fetish, body difference, the male gaze female body building, suicide girls and shemuscle.com

welcome to the new flesh....

couldn't think of a better, more apropos title than from david cronenberg's videodrome. after all, what could be more "new flesh" than the life of a person who is transgendered? it is, in so many ways, taking on a new life, it's the will of spirit to reframe the exterior that transforms the interior... it's the slow demolition of the gender binary he/she while at times reinforcing it.... new ways of looking at the world and how it looks at you. it is scary, it is exciting, and long live, viva, the new flesh!

it's not so much that this blog will be about the same things as videodrome, but rather, contemplation of being transgendered, personal ruminations, politics, hopefully some short stories, and thoughts about media (film, music , video games and television). i suppose that with the last bit there is some overlap. and i do love the middle films of cronenberg-- the fly, existenz, crash, dead zone, naked lunch... there is something i find so understandable about "body horror" it is about being betrayed by one's body. something i think most transpeople can relate to.

explanation under belt, now, let's move on to other things: i should warn you, i write in "emailese." if you are looking for capitol letters at the start of sentences, strict rules of syntax, turn back now. i write as things occur to me, and i try to check things, but i don't always get it all. to me this is about getting the thought out. hopefully, on my best days, my take on things will provoke you to think and question.

my history with blogs is... checkered... i did have a blog about many sordid things. escorting for a living, my personal life when i was very much in love, my job... i have had the trifecta of getting-burnt-from-something-in-my-blog. lost my job, girlfriend, and my life went to hell. sadly (or not so sadly for those i wrote about), the site i blogged on burnt to the ground-- in a way and i lost all of those years of writing. but after a couple year's hiatus, i miss it. i need it. it put things in perspective and gave me another useless artistic outlet. something i can never have enough of. i used to joke that i had 3 readers, a record that i hope to maintain. as much as i write this for me, it is good to have a few readers. but as i said this is about getting the thought out.

so there.

-nicki